Lord, teach us to pray (Part I)
Posted By admin on August 31, 2008
Ye … desire to have, and cannot obtain: … yet ye have not, because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts ( James4:2-3).
This verse shows one of the reasons our prayers do not get answered. The problem is not lack of prayer. The problem is the motive for our needs, hence “that ye may consume it upon your lusts” James 4:3. The Spirit of Truth knows the spirit in which we are requesting, “and he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God” (Romans 8:27). The Spirit knows our true motives. The Spirit knows those groanings, which are our needs which we cannot express.
And he (Spirit) knows when our requests are for self glory, selfishness, or other motives that are contrary to the will of God. The Spirit knows if our requests are for our own lusts. Our lusts, can then pose as infirmities, that is weaknesses, a condition of being feeble, frailty, and personal failing, or walking in the flesh (Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary [1913]). If left unchecked these (infirmities) will hinder our prayers from being heard and our requests being answered.
For our prayers to be heard, and for us to receive when we ask, our words and our thoughts, must first of all be acceptable to God, be according to the will of God, hence: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight O’ Lord my strength and my redeemer” (Psalms 19:14).
COGSOC Copy Right © August/Ab 2008
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